A D.C. bartender says that on the night of June 27, his Uber driver kicked him out because he’s gay.
Chris “Skipp” Williams was finishing up his shift as a bartender on U Street when he got an Uber to take him home. Everything seemed fine at first. Then, Williams got a call from his grandfather asking how his night went.
As Williams told Metro Weekly, he responded by saying, “Ooh darling it has been a night. Oh it’s been busy with all this crazy.”
Williams says as soon as driver heard the word “darling,” he became upset and pulled over.
“I’m like, wait, this is new. This isn’t my stop,” Williams recounted. “He said ‘you literally actually need to get out of my car, because I’m not taking you anywhere.’ And, so I’m looking at this man, like, what, wait a minute. What’s wrong?”
It was then that the driver responded by saying, “If you don’t get out of my car right now, I’m going to call the police.”
Williams, confused by the situation, reports that he tried to calm the driver down and asked what the problem was. When Williams wouldn’t get out of the car, the Uber driver called the cops.
It was then that Williams pulled out his own phone and started recording the scene.
Thankfully (or rather, obviously), the police saw nothing wrong with William’s side of the situation and thus no police report was filed.
As Williams found his way home, his initial calm persona became enraged.
“I was so angry, that I was like, ‘uh-uh. I’m sending this to somebody, somebody’s gotta fix this,'” he says. “I just wanted my friends to see it, and be like, ‘y’all see that shit? Do y’all see this?'”
Williams then uploaded the above video to Facebook where it has been viewed more than 7,000 times.
He also added the hashtag #bigotBob to the video’s description in reference to the continuing saga of people calling the police on black people for small matters like sleeping in dorm common rooms, selling water, and having barbecues.
After contacting Uber, who said they would launch an investigation, Williams claims that the driver told the company that he was “overly flirtatious” and “used physical contact.” Plus, the driver is threatening legal action.
Meanwhile, Chris Williams says he just wishes the driver had talked to him or, at least, respected him.
“Instead of trying to push your beliefs on someone else, maybe instead, have a conversation,” Williams says. “Maybe instead try to understand who that person is.”
He continued: “I think that we should just…love each other more. And if you don’t like me, you don’t have to like me, you don’t have to love me, but what I do require of you is to respect me.”
h/t: MetroWeekly
What kind of phone was that
What kind of phone was that shot with? An iPhone 1?